RESEARCH METHOD COHEN ok

194 HISTORICAL AND DOCUMENTARY RESEARCH
and oral testimony provided by actual participants
in, or witnesses of, an event, but also the
participants themselves. Documents considered
as primary sources include manuscripts, charters,
laws, archives of official minutes or records, files,
letters, memoranda, memoirs, biography, official
publications, wills, newspapers and magazines,
maps, diagrams, catalogues, films, paintings,
inscriptions, recordings, transcriptions, log books
and research reports. All these are, intentionally
or unintentionally, capable of transmitting a firsthand
account of an event and are therefore
considered as sources of primary data. Historical
research in education draws chiefly on the kind of
sources identified in this second category.
Secondary sources are those that do not bear
adirectphysicalrelationshiptotheeventbeing
studied. They are made up of data that cannot be
described as original. A secondary source would
thus be one in which the person describing
the event was not actually present but who
obtained descriptions from another person or
source. These may or may not have been primary
sources. Other instances of secondary sources used
in historical research include: quoted material,
textbooks, encyclopedias, other reproductions of
material or information, prints of paintings or
replicas of art objects. Best (1970) points out
that secondary sources of data are usually of
limited worth because of the errors that result
when information is passed on from one person to
another.
Various commentators stress the importance of
using primary sources of data where possible (Hill
and Kerber 1967). The value, too, of secondary
sources should not be minimized. There are
numerous occasions where a secondary source can
contribute significantly to more valid and reliable
historical research than would otherwise be the
case.
One further point: the review of the literature
in other forms of educational research is regarded
as a preparatory stage to gathering data and serves
to acquaint researchers with previous research on
the topics they are studying (Travers 1969). It
thus enables them to continue in a tradition,
to place their work in context, and to learn
from earlier endeavours. The function of the
review of the literature in historical research,
however, is different in that it provides the
data for research; the researchers’ acceptance or
otherwise of their hypotheses will depend on
their selection of information from the review
and the interpretation they put on it. Borg
(1963) has identified other differences: one is
that the historical researcher will have to peruse
longer documents than the empirical researcher
who normally studies articles very much more
succinct and precise. Further, documents required
in historical research often date back much
further than those in empirical research. And
one final point: documents in education often
consist of unpublished material and are therefore
less accessible than reports of empirical studies in
professional journals.
For a detailed consideration of the specific
problems of documentary research, the reader
is referred to the articles by Platt (1981) where
she considers those of authenticity, availability
of documents, sampling problems, inference and
interpretation.
Evaluation
Because workers in the field of historical research
gather much of their data and information from
records and documents, these must be carefully
evaluated so as to attest their worth for the
purposes of the particular study. Evaluation of
historical data and information is often referred to
as historical criticism and the reliable data yielded
by the process are known as historical evidence.
Historical evidence has thus been described as that
body of validated facts and information which
can be accepted as trustworthy, as a valid basis
for the testing and interpretation of hypotheses.
Historical criticism is usually undertaken in two
stages: first, the authenticity of the source is
appraised; and second, the accuracy or worth of
the data is evaluated. The two processes are known
as external and internal criticism respectively, and
since they each present problems of evaluation
they merit further inspection.